Reyne of Castamere
by RoaOAI
Summary: Behind every line of every song, lies a story. Especially a song this powerful.
1. And who are you, the proud lord said

He closed his eyes. His people waited in the grand chamber, hearts in their throats, hoping against hope that his wife, too fragile by far, would survive this. They hoped for a son, they hoped for a daughter, they hoped to still have a lady when this was done. He closed his eyes and his ears against her screams, and promised on his honor as a Lord, he would not let her die.

There was a second of breathless silence, and he grabbed for the handle into her chambers. As the heavy oak door opened, a new voice screamed, a very loud voice coming from the tiny bundle held in one of the midwives arms. He let out a breath that sounded like a gasp and collapsed against the doorframe. From the bed, his beautiful, beautiful wife smiled at him, pale with exertion but otherwise alright.

He moved to her side, and was given the tiny bundle of cloth. One small, pudgy hand reached up towards his face, and he felt himself smile tenderly as he handed their child to his wife. The little hand grabbed hold of his finger, and he leaned forward to see the tiny face.

"And who are you, little one?" His wife smiled at him and bounced the newborn a little.

"This is Levail Reyne, of Castamere, and your daughter, my love."


	2. That I must bow so low?

_Five years later_

"Levvy, come on! Hurry it up!" Nikla turned, eyes bright. "We have to get home or Nurse will eat us alive!" Levail let out a squeal, and raced forward as fast as her short legs would carry her, careful not to spill the berries she had in her basket. She had an idea that her father would like them, if they weren't poisonous. The last ones had been.

She topped the rise and froze, eyes wide, staring at what she saw before her. Her home, Castamere Hall, awash in flames. She was not so close that she could see the bodies, but she knew they must be there. Father had been speaking angrily for weeks, but she had ignored his words. A rider turned from the mass and rode towards them, she on the hilltop and Nikla on the final descent, both standing halted with shock. Levail waited just long enough to see the man's sword sever her friend's head from her body, before turning and running through the trees, staggering over roots and falling in the mud, picking the ways she hoped a horse would have the hardest time following. She ran, ducking under branches, until finally she spotted a cavern deep under the rocks. She could have sworn there were hoofbeats right behind her as she dove for it, curling into a tight ball over her knees, bowed and invisible underneath the stone face of the cliff. That was how she spent the night, legs going numb beneath her as she hid from the people who killed her family. As she hid from the Lannisters.


	3. Only a cat of a different coat

_Twenty years later_

She had not been here in years. She had grown into a woman, wiry and strong as the trees around her. And every night, no matter what she had done that day, she dreamt of the night her family was massacred. She supposed it was only natural that she would return to this place, where she would have been such a different person had the fates fallen on another path. Levail Reyne topped the rise above Castamere, her face held tight, revealing nothing as she surveyed. While her eyes were open, she saw the barely charred remnants of her home, shining in the light. She saw the graves. While she blinked, though, the flames burned still, and corpses littered the ground. Seeing this, she forced herself to walk down the hill.

The grand hall had barely changed. She half-expected her father to walk in at any instant, that smile on his face he only ever had for her, and ask her where she'd been all this time. Instead, the wind whistled through broken stained glass, and she drifted on. The tapestries were gone, her mothers needlepoint either burned or looted. She hoped it was the first. Imagining her mother's work on Lannister walls was enough to make her breath come in short, angry gasps. The throne lay where it had been left, only now it was split down the center with weathering and there was blood stained into the upholstery.

It took her time to find what she was looking for. Tywin's men had been good, but she had been a toddler here. Levail knew places to look that no Lannister would ever think of. The door opened with a heavy creak, and she took what felt like her first real breath in hours, weeks, years. There, hanging on the wall, was her father's sword and armour.


	4. That's all the truth I know

_A few months later_

Robb Stark marveled at the sheer variety of soldiers he got volunteering for his army. Looking across them, he noticed tall, short, fat, thin, underprepared and actually ready. One caught his eyes, and he paused for a moment. An armored woman stood there, a large claymore strapped across her back. She wore armor with copper details that caught his eyes, and when he looked into her face he got back a blank look, like stone, hiding rage and hatred. He walked to stand in front of her.

"Who are you?" her eyelashes fluttered as she blinked, fast.

"Nikla, your honour." Her answer held none of the quick easiness of a practiced lie, so he nodded to her sword.

"Glad to have your blade in our forces, Nikla, but may I ask why?" A slight, sardonic smile crossed her face.

"I have a personal score to settle with the Lannisters, King of the North."


	5. A coat of gold or a coat of red

Jaime's world had shrunk to just what he could see from his little cell. Most often, it was dominated by whomever they sent to guard over him. He wasn't sure whether the guard was there to keep him from escaping, or to protect him from the other soldiers. It didn't really matter, though, since most of the abuse he'd received came from the guard himself.

There was a whistle, and his current jailor stood with a smirk. This one had spat on him, and Jaime was glad that he didn't have to stare at the ugly lunk anymore. His new guard hove into view, and he felt his eyebrow rise. She was pretty, with long black hair pulled back hard from a tanned face. She held a sword easily over one shoulder, and when she sat she leaned it against the wall. A long knife was pulled out of a boot, and Jaime studied her face. In profile, her mouth was tight and her eyes hard on the whetstone and shiv in her hand.

"You look angry, lovely." The stone jarred to the side when he spoke, and she muttered a curse. After fixing the edge, and without looking at him, she spoke.

"The King of the North is testing me." He opened his mouth to ask what she meant, and she glanced up, pinning him in place with her eyes. "He has made me swear to leave you alive." She turned and stabbed her blade back into her boot.

Jaime watched her sharpen and polish her sword. He'd always found the task calming, but right now, he found it a subtle, effective threat. Finally, as her watch ended he prepared himself to speak. She seemed to know, and gave him another inscrutable icy glare as she stood.

"Thank Robb Stark for your life, Lannister." His eyebrows jumped, and he felt a little sick. That was the first time in his entire life someone had used his name, his family, as both an insult and a curse.

"Careful, girl, even a caged lion has claws." Her eyebrow rose, cold.

"Indeed."


	6. Mine are long and sharp, my Lord

The battle was cruel. She fought forward, eyes locked on the half-man mounted on his horse. If she looked to either side, she knew she would be frozen again by terror, so she just focused on the Lannister before her. Death. It fell from the skies above her, closed on every side, and somehow missed the one she really wished to see die.

Her arm closed around his leg, dragging him off the back of his horse, and her sword was ready to split his skull down the seams, but she couldn't. She had killed men before, many of them, but they had all stood a chance. This dwarf, essentially unarmed, pinned by her foot, she did not wish to kill him, only to kill what he was. Lannister. She let out a growl and drove her blade into the dirt beside his head, before ripping it back and turning away, back into the fray. It was not Tyrion she wished to kill, it was Tywin.

In the end, she was not strong enough to escape capture. She was chained in a line with the others and made to walk.


	7. And so he spoke, that Lord of Castamere

Every other prisoner collapsed to their knees, gasping for air, before Tywin's feet, except for her. She planted her feet wide, instead, and glared at him, trying not to waver and fall.

He came over and grabbed her chin, hard.

"Who are you, girl?" Her voice growled as she replied.

"Nikla Millegel. Lannister." He frowned into her eyes, until a look of shock crashed over him, and he stepped back.

"You're a Reyne." She didn't refute it, instead simply glared daggers at.

"You though it was over. You thought it ended when all the bodies were counted and left in a pile, when the flames finally burned down to stone and died. It will never, ever be forgotten. It must never happen again." His gaze hardened back again, and her chin rose, strong.

"Lock this one away, let her rot."


	8. And now the rains weep o'er his hall

Tyrian was there, when his father received the message that a prisoner had escaped. He rode with his brother and the guard to Castamere Hall, and wondered that she would again return there.

The great doors opened with a crash that was swallowed by the silence overwhelming the massive hall. His eyes did not catch her the first two times he scanned the silent expanse. It was not until the slow, musical slide of a whetstone on a blade broke the stillness that he noticed her.

She sat upon the throne, dressed in an outdated crimson gown, her black hair pulled back into a simple braid, her head bent to her task.

They waited. They waited until she set the stone aside and placed the sword carefully across her lap. They waited until those steely grey eyes rose to meet Tywin Lannister's. They waited until she, ever so slightly, nodded. Then, the archers unleashed their arrows, pinning her to the throne in a dozen places. The whirring, clattering sound faded back into the serene silence, and Tywin approached. A sad, slight half-smile played across her lips as she looked at him.

"I decided," Her hand stirred feebly, "There had been enough blood spilled on the floor." With those words, she died.

Tywin Lannister turned his horse and rode from Castamere Hall. His guard followed, but his sons did not.

It was Lannister hands that dug her grave, Lannister money that paid for her headstone, and the only attendees to her funeral were Lannister sons. It was Lannister voices who swore, in the name of Levail Reyne, to never allow another massacre.


	9. With not a soul to hear

He pressed a hand to the door, eyes wide and eager. Lunch was over, he was done his lessons, it was time to get out and do interesting things.

"Lad, where are you running off to?" Cook shouted from the kitchens, just down the hall.

"Off to explore!" He shouted back.

"Alright, well, see to it your home for supper." He was halfway out of the door when she added a comment.

"And don't skin your knees!"

He'd found this place last time, a long grassy stretch like a road in the middle of the woods. People always told ghost stories about this part, but he didn't mind. They never really scared him, anyway. He walked until he came to a seeming end, and was about to turn back when a clearing to the side caught his eye.

Gravestones, old ones, some leaning like broken teeth, others still standing. He couldn't read most of the names, but it looked like they had all died in the same year. One was relatively newer than the rest, the grave of 'Nikla Millegel' bearing the epitaph that she was a true and giving friend. He examined them for a while, noting the rather marvelous ones some of them had, and was about to return to the path when something marble glinted. He went back, and figured that the hedges now blocking his way were new, and there was something fascinating behind them. They clung to his clothes as he climbed through, but he made it, to stand victorious where no foot had trod in a decade.

When his eyes finally realized what he was seeing, his jaw dropped. Before him stood a castle, magnificent despite it's antiquity. He was preparing to wander in, when he spotted another memorial.

It was a marble gravestone, twice his height, and carved beautifully. In the center, a sword had been wedged into a groove that fit it so tightly he wasn't sure if it could be removed. The thing was glorious, but he pulled his eyes away from it to read the inscription. It read;

_Here lies the Red Lady,_

_Levail Reyne,_

_The last Lion on Castamere Hall._

_May she find Peace._


End file.
